


Looking Ahead

by Omorka



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Post - Deathly Hallows
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-31
Updated: 2012-07-31
Packaged: 2017-11-11 02:39:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/473575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Omorka/pseuds/Omorka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hermione notices something while going through their old school things, and comes up with an intriguing hypothesis.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Looking Ahead

**Author's Note:**

> Does contain a mention of a canonical character death. Intended to take place after they're married but before their first child.

Hermione had been up in the attic for entirely too long. Ron debated apparating up there, but he'd probably land on top of some old piece of furniture and knock things over. Sighing, he climbed the ladder instead.

An old, ratty trunk was open a few yards from the trap door, past the bags of outgrown school robes and a dress form Ron didn't even recognize. Hermione was sitting on a stack of textbooks, poring over a pile of scrolls. The oldest ones were beginning to yellow at the edges.

Ron picked his way around the junk and crouched next to her. "Hey," he probed gently, "what's up?"

"For someone who wasn't even trying, you had a remarkably good hit rate," she replied.

"Huh?" Ron's cheeks burned - it bugged him more than he let on that his wife was always three steps ahead of him. Good thing she had so many other good qualities. He leaned over and saw that she was holding one of his old papers from Divinations class. "Why on earth are you bothering with that old mess? We should have burned it years ago," he pointed out.

"Maybe," she mused, "but I remember reading over some of these for Harry, and he was terrible at it." Her finger fell to a line about halfway down the roll. "Whereas so far you've been around 75% correct, allowing for a certain amount of interpretation, which pretty much everyone does as far as this stuff is concerned."

"Why are you even worried about it?" Ron looked at her strangely. "I thought you thought all this was a load of tosh."

"I did until all that nonsense about Trelawney's two prophesies," Hermione agreed. "I still do, mostly. But you do this around the house, too, sometimes."

"Do what?" Ron was getting more and more bewildered.

"Toss off a joking comment about something, and then it turns out to be completely right, allowing, again, for a certain amount of interpretation," she explained. Her eyes narrowed. "How many older siblings did your father have again?"

"Nine," Ron answered, "Three sisters and six brothers, although I've only met two - the older ones were blown up by a bomb during that big Muggle war. Why?"

"So he _is_ a seventh son," Hermione said triumphantly.

"Well, yeah." Ron drew up his knees. "I asked about that when I was five, if my parents were disappointed that Ginny was a girl, 'cause if she'd been a seventh son then she'd have had the second sight." His mouth quirked up at the memory. "Mum bloody near laughed in my face, said she was just relieved to finally have a little girl. Then she realized that might have made me feel like she wished _I'd_ been a girl, and gave me an extra biscuit to make it up to me."

Hermione set down the scroll she was holding and picked up the next one, scanning it. "What did your Dad say?" she asked, gently.

Ron frowned. "Not much. Said that was an old tradition, and no one really knew whether it was true, not even the Ministry."

"And your brothers?" Hermione tapped at a couple of words with her fingernail.

Ron opened his mouth, then closed it again. "I'm - you know, I think Charlie said something about -" He stopped talking, swallowed, then continued, "He said Ginny couldn't have been a seventh son even if she were a boy, and then Bill kicked him."

"Have you ever noticed," Hermione said quietly, "that there's an interrupted order in your family?" When Ron merely stared at her, she added, "Arthur, Bill, Charlie - then Percy - then Fred and George. Fred was the older by five minutes, right?"

"Yeeesss," Ron said, drawing the word out. "I'm not sure what you're getting at - unless, I mean, I've noticed the A, B, C pattern before, and Percy's middle name is Edmund, but then -"

"I wonder," Hermione said softly, "if perhaps you've lost more than one brother to Voldemort and the Death Eaters."

Ron blinked. "But - why would that be a secret; surely someone would have told me -"

"If he died as a baby," Hermione explained, her voice full of sympathy, "maybe it was too painful for your mother to remember." She thought for a moment. "Or - I wonder if stillbirths count; that's almost as painful, and lots of families choose not to remember those, at least not officially. That might not even have made it onto something like the Black tapestry." She straightened up, and continued, "At any rate, there are birth records at the Ministry that we can get at." She watched his face with pointed interest. "Do you want to know?"

Ron pulled himself to his feet. "Yeah, actually, I think I do. If I'm ever going to go all tranced-out and prophesy the rise of the next dark lord, I want to be prepared."

Hermione laughed. "I don't think it has to work like that."

"I don't know, that's the thing." Ron's face was grim. "If Mum's been keeping the secret this long, she's not about to give it up now. Let's go talk to Charlie; if it's true, he almost let it slip once. If he's a no-go we can try the Ministry later."

Hermione stood up and brushed the dust of the attic off of her robes. "All right. Let's go by Floo; it's rather far to apparate."

"Yeah, that'll be better," Ron mumbled, then shook his head. "Wait, no, if you're right, I don't want to start making predictions."

"If we're right, whether you want to or not may not matter very much," Hermione warned, but she didn't look worried. If anything, she seemed to be faintly proud of him. "Besides," she murmured, "it might mean you'll be ahead of me for once."

"Not likely," he protested, but he smiled all the same.


End file.
